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I want to scream. VENT (long)

So I mentioned some of this in my post in yesterday's "Confession Thursday" thread (which I keep getting Operation Aborted, so I can't see all of the posts in that thread), but it turns out that was just the beginning of wedding stress day from hell.

So, first I find out that people are having difficulty finding available rooms now if they want to stay the whole week of my wedding. My wedding day is on Wednesday, May 4th, so most people are staying the whole week, because why wouldn't you? The day after, is May 5th, Cinco de Mayo. Apparently that one day is why people, if they're just now getting around to trying to book a room even though they've known they needed to for 5 months, are having problems. That day is filling up the resort because of the holiday. And it's only that day--if you try to book the trip, for say May 1-5 (checking out on the 5th), you're fine. Or May 6 and afterwards is fine. Why oh why do people wait until the last dang minute (everyone's RSVPs are due March 1st, less than 2 weeks away) to book things, especially when given ALL the info in September and told to book early to make sure they have a room!!!!!!!!!!

So I emailed my TA about it to see if there were rooms available reserved for my wedding (a block of rooms), and there 3 and she's requesting 2 additional in the cheap rooms, although she doesn't know for sure if she can get those two). So that's at least SOME good news, although the number of people we're expecting to still book is more than the 5 rooms, at most, we'll have blocked off. The TA also said she could possibly request more rooms if we need it since their parent company owns part of the resort.

That part of the email was the somewhat good news. It was then followed by this bomb: apparently my FMIL, who told FI and I her and FFIL were paying for our flights and accomdations, told the TA she wanted to apply the complimentary rooms we get through our deal with the TA to the rooms they said they were paying for us (since we're bringing all this business with us, every 6th room booked through the TA for the whole wedding guest list is complimentary to us when booking a certain class of room; we can apply it to whatever we want though--rooms, ceremony, just get cash, etc). WTF!!! Um, that's essentially just making US pay for the rooms. Which is fine and what we had originally planned on until future in laws told us they would be covering that for us. So that was not the plan as of AUGUST, so we have since moved on from those plans. We wanted to apply that (which as of yesterday was up to $2500) to 1) help one of my bridesmaids come to the wedding by paying for her accomdations (she is my best friend from college and I was extremely worried she wouldn't be able to come since she had a baby in September. I was worried about her finances along with everything else going on in her life. When I asked her to be a bridesmaid, I offered to help pay for her to come, knowing about the complimentary room deal, which is turning out to be about $800 for the week); 2) possibly help a couple of FI's really good friends, who I know really well as well so I want them there too, be able to come since they've both been laid off within the last year; 3) possibly help my sister and her husband a little since we felt bad they have to pay for 2 destination weddings within 2 months of eachother (brother in law's sister's wedding, which is in 1 week); and 4) if we had enough left over we wanted to use the money toward the wedding costs that we're paying for (we're paying for the ceremony, dinner, party, etc). I told FI he had to talk to mom about this since this would put a HUGE wrench into our plans and budget. And again, it's not like I'm opposed to us paying for our rooms since that's what we originally planned on doing, but that hasn't been the plan for 6 months and wasn't part of the budget. To put this freaking bomb on us this close to the wedding just floored me.

So, FI called his mom about this issue last night. She didn't know what we had planned to use the money for, so she's still going to honor her word that they were paying for our accomodations (and its not like it's THAT much, for them anyway, considering the woman already spent more on earrings for me and wants to spend even more on a bracelet for me (which is still more than what the room costs; I'm probably going to tel lher not to get the bracelt after all this). What really chapped my hide during this discussion, is that after some "I don't knows" from FI, he put his mom on speakerphone so I could hear what she was saying and be part of the conversation. She said we shouldn't be putting the money towards helping out our friends and we should put toward the ceremony, she asked what my mom was contributing towards the cost of the wedding (which isn't really her business,since they never discussed it with each other in the first place and we only discussed it with our respective parents when we first started planning and thus determined our budget for the whole thing). So that put me in an awkward spot. I said my mom was paying for my wedding dress (which she did) and that's it. That was the plan from the beginning and everyone knew this. That's all she did for when my sister got married too 7 1/2 years ago. I kept mouthing to FI to put me off speakerphone since it's none of her business how WE want to spend the money that WE are receiving for OUR deal with the travel agent. It's our decision. I'm going to honor my word/offer for my friend. The rest is debatable about how we spend it.

THEN, after that discussion, FI's mom then goes into the costs for the ceremony and that we're going to go over the number of people that is included in the package. We already knew this and expected it. Again, this is not her business since FI and I were paying for this the whole time. So we know we're going to have to pay for each additional person, which is probably going to be between 20 and 30 extra people (the package is for 20 people, we're looking at 40-50 people).

So then after we get off the phone, FI starts freaking out about the cost of the ceremony, even though he's known about this for 6 months, saying he doesn't have that money just laying around. He told me 6 months ago, that I didn't need to worry about the cost of the wedding. I assumed he had saved it and it was budgeted for already considering he knew what it was going to cost forever (and his main reason for waiting to propose was to save up for the wedding). So why the hell is he bringing this up now!!! I asked him how much he's getting back from his taxes, and I was like--there you go. That's the cost of the wedding (which really, isn't that much in the scheme of things; we'd be spending way more if it was here). Or we could put some of it on credit cards and pay off over time like most people. He's very anal though and ALWAYS pays off his credit card in full every month. Yes, that's good, but it's not the end of the world to take a few months to pay it off as long as the payments are on time. This is how the world works.

He looked at me, and I'm obviously upset about all, and said "you look pissed." I told him I wasn't exactly pissed, but it's just a lot to take in for ONE DAY. I grabbed a botle of wine and headed upstairs to our bedroom to watch Grey's Anatomy.

Alright, that's it. Bottle of wine for everyone that made it through all that! Feeling a little better to get it all out there.